The Best Laid Plans and Pride Before a Fall!

I finished another long run at work on Friday and was sorely looking forwards to my six days off before going back on shift again. The last month at work had been particularly difficult due to many of the patients on the unit along with some staff had contracted the dreaded Norovirus, commonly known as the "winter sickness bug". Believe me it's been messy at times. I was priding myself on managing to miss the "sickness" myself, putting this down to good infection control practices!. I had great plans to go fishing at my local lake (Little Allers) on Sunday, and was all set to go up and fish the Exeter Ship Canal on the following Tuesday to attempt to catch my first Pike. I had been put in contact with a retired gentleman from the Exeter area who knew the canal well, and was a keen Pike angler who supplemented his pension through what I can only describe as very reasonable charges for four hours guiding. This was going to be a short cut to success for me hopefully, and I felt confident I had made the right choice. I spent Saturday visiting my local tackle shop where I bought some terminal tackle suitable for the job and some frozen baits, these being Mackerel, and Lamprey, I was going to get anything else I needed on the day.

I got up to "Little Allers" on Sunday, which was a beautiful sunny day though a bit cool in the brisk wind. I set up a strawberry boilie on a hair leger rig as a sleeper rod, and set about catching the resident Roach population using red and white maggots, and very obliging they were too, keeping me busy at a fish a cast when I got them on the feed. The only problem was they were averaging around eight to the pound with the occasional 5oz - 8oz specimen (and I use that word very lightly) thrown in. I couldn't help thinking that even a "Jack" would probably turn their nose up at such small fry. It was good fun, and brought out the little boy in me as I tried to build a weight. The lake had some new residents in the form of Canada Geese, and what noisy devils they were too, and inquisitive with it, coming over to see what I was loose feeding. I took the opportunity to photograph the goose below.

"Canada Goose"

I only had two runs on the "sleeper" rod, one of which was a really blistering run which I managed to miss somehow, and at the very end of my session, a couple of clicks of my reel resulted in the fin perfect Carp below, that put up a very determined effort which belied the fact he or she was only about nine pounds. I particularly like the redness of the fins, and the perfect scale pattern, a fine example of a common.

"Fin Perfect Common Carp"

I thoroughly enjoyed my session at the lake, and was now well and truly excited about the prospect of Pike fishing on Tuesday. I always wash my rods, reels and sort all my tackle out on return from fishing, and this trip was no exception, in fact if anything I was even more thorough than usual. My wife says I spend more time washing my fishing tackle than I do the car, and I am slightly ashamed to admit this is the case. It's just another symptom of my fishing addiction. Yesterday was spent browsing blogs (fishing of course or fishing porn as my wife calls it!), washing the cars (I had been shamed into it) and I spooled my Shimano Twin Power XT-RB reel with fresh line. This reel has a fantastic line-lay and drag system, it's the best reel I have and would be more than suitable for Pike. Everything was set for my adventure!. I called Bob to see if everything was still alright his end, and double checked the directions to where we would meet up. The fall was only five hours away at this point, with the first signs of nausea coming before I even ate my evening meal. I tried to dismiss the nausea at first but it continued to build over the next few hours, and I am sure you can guess the rest. Suffice to say I didn't stray far from the bathroom. At 4am this morning I was still kidding myself that I would still make it to Exeter for 10am. At eight this morning I surrendered to the fact I had contracted Norovirus and contacted Bob to make my apologies. He was really understanding, saying he would no doubt go fishing anyway with nothing else planned. All I could think was aargh!!. I guess I tempted fate and suffered a bad case of a fall following pride, and what do they say about the best laid plans again. There is always another day I guess, but it will be some time before Bob is available again as he going to visit his daughter in sunny California next week for two months. Oh well, I will just have to give it a go myself when I am next off. Could be exciting!